Chinese Bridge Row: What Does India Need To Do?

There will be many more intrusions across the LAC if China perceives India is weak

- LT Gen (Retd) Philip Campose

The surprise Chinese intrusions across the Line of Actual Control (LAC) in eastern Ladakh in April-May 2020 were a brazen attempt at ‘salami slicing’ aimed at grabbing disputed territory. It has pushed India-China relations to abysmal levels, similar to what existed in the period after the 1962 war. It appears that the improvement in relations—over the four decades following the pathbreaking Beijing visit in 1979 of foreign minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee—have been wiped out in one stroke.

Two years have passed since the multiple intrusions, and the clashes that followed at the Galwan river valley a month later. Yet, troops from both sides continue in ‘eyeball to eyeball’ deployment along the LAC, where tensions remain high.